cut and dried
by Jane Westin
Summary: Hermione gives Severus a haircut. Sex ensues. (Set 15 years post-DH.) If you're interested in context, it takes place approximately in my Blood Magic universe, but as with most PWP, context is really pretty irrelevant here :)


Hermione dragged a chair over to the sink, and Severus balked.

"Hermione," he said, scowling, "I assure you, this is completely unnecessary –"

"The state of you! Believe me," Hermione said, taking Severus's hand and pulling him toward the chair, "it is not." She pushed him gently. He sat.

"Besides," she added, draping one of the towels she'd conjured over the sink edge, "magical techniques aren't always better than Muggle methods."

He looked up at her, his expression sour. "Hair-trimming charms are perfectly acceptable."

She smiled and wrapped a second towel around his shoulders. "_Acceptable_ and _good_ are two very different things, Sev. Now shush." She pushed him gently, until the back of his neck was resting on the sink edge, and turned the water on.

"Warm enough?" she asked, and was rewarded with a surly grunt.

He didn't look at her as she poured water over his hair; his gaze roamed the ceiling, the walls.

She slicked her palms with shampoo and watched him. "All right?"

He opened his mouth as though he intended to answer; but at that moment she curled her fingers into his hair, and instead he gasped.

Something shot through Hermione, fingers to toes, like a bolt of electricity. It suddenly occurred to her that this wasn't at all like a Muggle salon, where pleasant strangers groomed indifferently. No, they were alone in the dim dungeons, close enough that she could feel the heat of his body, and she was touching him as she'd never touched him in over twenty years of knowing him.

She bit the inside of her cheek and forced her hands to move. "All right?" she said again, lightly, and he closed his eyes and nodded.

She worked the shampoo into a lather, and what of it, if she moved a little slower than when she cut little Albus's and James's hair? They were children, and Severus was—well. _Well_.

She watched his face as she worked. She scraped her nails across his scalp a few times, experimentally, and something inside her went loose and hot when she saw how his eyes shut tighter and his breath caught.

All these years beside him, all these years of friendship. Was it possible that he wanted her? Or was it just a physical reaction to touch after so long without?

She rinsed the shampoo, careful of the tangles she'd created, and went to conditioner next.

He opened his eyes when he felt her smooth it onto his head. "What is that?"

She shook her head. "Honestly, Sev."

"I'll do without the mockery, thanks," he said, scowling.

"It's conditioner." Hermione gently worked a knot out of his hair, trying to quell the strange hum that had started up in her stomach.

"Muggle nonsense," he grumbled, but he closed his eyes again. His hair between her fingers was finely textured and thick; no wonder it looked oily so much of the time. She ran the pads of her thumbs over his temples, let her fingertips slide across his occiput. His breathing was coarser than normal, and sounded peculiarly regular, as though he was focusing on _inhale, exhale, inhale. _She was half tempted to brush her hand over the pulse point in his throat, just to see if his heart was beating as hard as hers.

Once the conditioner was out, she sat him up.

"This is a tedious ritual," he observed, arching an eyebrow at her, but his normally pale face was flushed, and that diminished his snideness somewhat.

"Be that as it may," Hermione said mildly, scrubbing the excess water out of his hair with a towel. "You're a good sport."

"The things I do for you." He winced as she combed stray tangles. "Ouch. Be careful, Granger!"

"Toughen up." She brushed a finger lightly over the back of his neck, twice, and saw goosebumps immediately flare on his skin. She shivered.

When she'd finished cutting, his hair was an inch shorter; she'd gleefully added some layers to the back of his head, where he'd never see. She didn't have a blow dryer (and there'd be no place to plug it anyway), so she did the best she could with the towel.

"Quite finished?" Severus asked.

She left the towel draped over his head as she gathered her scissors and comb. "Yes," she said.

He pulled it off. "Thanks," he said, grudgingly.

"Pleasure's all mine," Hermione said, and flushed hotly as soon as the words left her lips.

He cleared his throat. "Ah. Well. I think – " Another throat-clearing cough. "The Great Hall is undoubtedly laid for dinner by now."

"Wait – " reaching up, for she'd spied centimeter-long pieces of hair at his throat, clinging to his still-damp skin.

Her hand had barely touched his neck when he bent and kissed her.

_Not just a reaction, then_, she thought. His lips were dry and warm, awkward but not unpleasant against hers. She kissed him back.

Maybe he was expecting a recoil, indignance, anger; because when she slid her hand up to wrap around the back of his neck and pull him closer, when she opened her mouth to deepen the kiss, she felt him sway and groan. She put her other hand on his waist to steady him.

"Easy," she murmured against his mouth, and the scrape of his stubble on her upper lip staunched any further thought.

He took a sip of air, as though he was going to reply, but she said "Hush" and kissed him again. Long kisses, leisurely and languid, and she could have kept on like that for hours, but the Sorting was tonight and he couldn't miss that.

She pulled back with regret, already missing the warmth of his body and the hard press of his erection against her stomach. He watched her with eyes like coals.

"Hermione –" he said hoarsely. "I—you—"

She stood on tiptoes and brushed a kiss over his jaw. "I'll come to your quarters after the feast," she said softly, "and we'll talk."

His hands tightened incrementally on her waist, then let go. "I'm counting on it," he said.

The Sorting seemed interminable.

Three quarters of the way through, when she couldn't rid herself of thoughts of Severus and she felt whole-body flushed with arousal, she politely excused herself from the Head Table.

"But you haven't had dessert," Professor Flitwick pointed out, as she pushed her chair back and stood.

_Not yet, but I will_, she thought. She plastered a pleasant smile on her face. "Just not feeling like it," she said apologetically.

She deliberately didn't meet Severus's eyes when she passed him, but she felt his gaze burning her until she was out of the Great Hall.

He'd given her a key to his quarters years and years ago, for purely practical reasons: access to rare ingredients, storage of equipment, to water his plants when he was gone, that sort of thing. She never dreamed she'd be using it for this.

She let herself in and locked the door behind her, and was immediately at a loss for what to do.

In Muggle romances, women were always sneaking into the homes of their paramours and doing ridiculous things like preparing candlelit dinners and strewing rose petals across the bed. Most of these scenarios involved the careful selection of lacy undergarments, of which Hermione had none.

It depended, she supposed, on what, exactly, she wanted to happen once Severus opened the door. Now that she had an answer to the immediate question, did she _really_ want to talk about it, or did she just want to fuck him and talk later?

Five years ago, she'd have wanted to discuss their options before taking any drastic measures. But tonight –

Tonight he wanted her, and she wanted him, and that was enough.

It would be another twenty minutes before the Houses were dismissed to their respective parts of the castle, and another thirty or so before each Head of House would be freed of their newly-minted charges, so Hermione decided to have a bath. And if Severus returned early and she was still in his tub, all the better.

No rose petals, but the bathtub had been freshly cleaned by the house-elves, and Hermione helped herself to some sweet-smelling herbs from one of Severus's cabinets. She sprinkled them in while the tub was filling with hot water and foam, and then lowered herself into the water to wait.

"_Accio_ music box," she said, as an afterthought, and the music box she'd bought Severus – enchanted to play Chopin, Strauss, and Verdi – came flying into the bathroom. A clue, anyway, for when he walked through the door.

She was not disappointed.

Not a quarter hour after she had climbed into the tub, she heard the key in the lock. The creak as he opened the door.

And then – nothing.

He was listening, surely able to hear from the foyer the music-box waltz.

"Hermione?" His voice sounded strangled.

She took a deep, steadying breath.

"In here," she called back, and hoped he couldn't hear the quaver in her tone.

The door shut hard; the lock turned; and in a moment he was in the bathroom doorway. As soon as he saw her, he froze and paled.

_Oh God._ Had she erred in her judgment? Had she made a mistake?

Then his fingers were fumbling for the clasp of his robe, and he was kicking off his boots, and she knew she hadn't.

"I hope this means what I think it means," he growled, stripping off his shirt. He was long-limbed and wiry, a sprinkling of dark hair across his chest and stomach—she'd seen him shirtless before, but not like this. Not at all like this.

She laughed, half with mirth, half with relief. "How much more obvious do I need to be?"

He kept his eyes on her as he unbuttoned his trousers. "You're sure," he said, not returning the smile.

Hermione pushed herself to her knees, then stood, dripping foam. Severus's hands stilled and he stared at her, mouth slightly open, pupils dilated so much that his eyes looked completely black.

"Does it _look_ like I'm anything but sure?" she said.

Two strides, and he was lifting her out of the tub. She swung her legs up to wrap around his waist and put her hands in his newly-cut hair and kissed him, hard and deep.

"I'm getting water everywhere," she gasped, as he turned toward the bedroom with her in his arms.

"You worry too much," he said, but he snagged a towel on the way out of the bathroom.

He placed her on top of the covers, too carefully for her taste, and began to dry her off.

"Merlin's sake, enough," she said, snatching the towel from him. She flung it across the room, seized his shoulders, and dragged him down on top of her.

He half-fell, knocking the wind out of her. She absorbed the shock by wrapping her legs around his hips to pull him closer. She felt him hard and hot through his unbuttoned trousers, and she kicked at them with her heels until he yanked them the rest of the way off.

She tore her lips from his and sank her teeth into the soft flesh of his neck, hard enough to hurt, and he let out a muted cry and bucked against her. She felt his long fingers curl into her hip as he thrust, the shaft of his cock sliding against the wet folds of her labia. He bucked again, groaning, his pelvic symphesis hitting her clit and making her gasp.

"Roll over," she hissed.

He did, taking her with him, and when she rubbed her body against his, brushing her breasts across the coarse hair on his chest, he sucked breath so hard she had to remind him to exhale.

He did, hard, closing his eyes and shuddering.

She dragged her lips across his throat, his jaw, his earlobe; she scraped her teeth across his nipples and shivered when he groaned. She ran her tongue over the pale planes of his stomach; but when she moved further, where the trail of dark curls thickened and spread, he took her by the upper arms and hauled her back up.

"Not yet," he rasped.

But he was trembling and taut, and gasped when she kissed him; so she took his cock lightly in her hand and straddled him.

She hadn't expected him to be terribly interactive during sex; she'd thought he might feel awkward about it, or embarrassed, and intimacy wasn't his strong point. So it surprised her when he tangled a hand in her hair and brought her forehead down to his. Breathing hard, he held her gaze.

"All right?" She had to force the words; it was hard to talk with the head of his cock pressed against her clit.

To her shock, he grinned.

"You really do– " a gasp as she lowered herself incrementally– "worry too much, Granger."

"And you're an incorrigible prat," she managed to say.

He started to reply, but she shook her head, and pushed forward, and in one smooth movement he slid into her. His eyes rolled back and he clutched at her waist, his back arching.

"Hermione –" he gritted out. "Please—"

She never did find out what he wanted, though, because then she was moving against him and everything else faded away. She leaned down and put her lips to his, not quite kissing him, inhaling his rhythmic moans; and she was dimly aware of his hands on her hips getting tighter and tighter, but it felt too good and she didn't want to stop and then she was coming, hard, the world shaking apart in a roar of light and color.

When she came back to herself, her elbows braced on either side of his head, he was looking at her.

She flushed. "Hi."

He looked amused. "Are you all right?"

"Shut up." She put her hand over his face. "Did you—"

He peered up at her between her fingers and chuckled. "You didn't notice?"

"Not exactly." She pulled her hand away and sat up, noting that he was softer, now, inside her. "Not as such."

"Well." He shifted beneath her, gently, and she shivered at the rush of warmth that followed as he slid out of her. "That's good, I suppose."

She stretched out beside him, her head on his shoulder, his arm around her.

"Good Sorting feast," he quipped.

She laughed. "Sev. You made a joke."

"Mm." He nodded into her hair. "Well. I suppose I have reason for joviality."

"_Suppose_?" Hermione pinched his side.

"I also suppose I should let you cut my hair more often," he added.

She laughed, and so did he, and it was enough.


End file.
